Way of the Sword

by Blaze Ward

  Way of the Sword

  Shepherd of the Word: Book One

  Blaze Ward

  Knotted Road Press

  Contents

  Way of the Sword

  About the Author

  Also by Blaze Ward

  About Knotted Road Press

  Way of the Sword

  She’d always known it was a longshot, but Wilhelmina Teague had been known to play a few of those in her already extraordinary life. Looking around the bar where she found herself today, she couldn’t help but make comparisons to the others in here.

  How many of these other people could say that they were five hundred and twenty-five years old? She didn’t look a day over thirty-four, which was her actual defrosted age. Occasionally, she had to stop and remember that her identity papers listed her as being born in Union/Concord Era 553.

  7518 CE using the most ancient of calendars, dating back to Earth itself, although few people counted that way anymore. But it had been the standard when she was young.

  Mina had actually been born in Union/Concord Era 64, long before that actually became the way everyone measured things.

  And then trapped in that stupid mine field for four hundred and eighty-eight years, asleep in a cryo unit and dreaming that someone would eventually come rescue her.

  Prince Charming eventually arrived, all things considered. Tall, dark, and handsome, even if he was a smart-ass, nerdy, ex-Concord officer, pirate Janissary serving out his parole to another Ex-Concord officer pirate warlord.

  Javier had saved her from dragons, pirates, and slavers. Given her enough money to buy a nice, long-range personal cruiser that let her set back out on the quest that had defined her life five centuries ago.

  Finding Rama Treadwell. The Voice of the Union itself.

  The Prophet who had preached a self-contained pacifism that all creatures should be free to seek out the greatest joy and utility for themselves, without carving that out of someone else’s life. And to put an end to the Corporate War with the Unification of Man.

  Mina was sadly glad that Rama had disappeared before the Unification Wars started, so he didn’t ever see how badly some folks had misinterpreted his words. Or set out to kill other people in the name of universal peace.

  Today, the man was largely forgotten, except as a historical footnote and a few speeches that had been recorded. Several books of theory and collections of speeches that she had acquired over the last few years, but not much else.

  Still, that dream had been enough, six centuries ago, to give birth to an order dedicated to bringing peace to the galaxy. To sending out scholars and preachers carrying Rama’s Word to all the dark corners.

  To give people hope.

  The Shepherds of the Word.

  She had been one of them, five years ago. Or four hundred and ninety-three, depending on whether you wanted to count her personal clock, or the one everyone else had relied on while she had played the ultimate game of Sleeping Beauty in an impossible tower fastness.

  A’Nacia. The Haunted Planet. The place where so many ships had died on a bright August day, 6964 CE. The day the Unification Wars ended in the most destructive, most pyrrhic victory in the fabulously bloody history of mankind.

  The place where she had later ended up trapped for all those centuries.

  Mina sighed and took another sip from the blue drink in front of her.

  Five years and she hadn’t found any trace of what had happened to Rama. She had made a few converts in her semi-random travels, stopping to preach here and there to a galaxy that seemed poised on the edge of another conflagration, but nothing large enough to even be noticed.

  She wasn’t Rama reborn. She had height and beauty, according to many. Brains in the form of several degrees. But she could not set a stadium crowd on fire with her words.

  Not that she needed to today.

  Mina had taken a month off for herself.

  Longshot, but weren’t they all? After they had rescued Djamila from the other pirates, she and Javier had made a date. Sort of.

  Scheduled whatever rendezvous one might, five years out, when one person was then a slave and the other had just woken up from a five century nap.

  This bar. Tonight. For old time’s sake.

  Or something.

  She’d never been to this planet before, but bars like this never seemed to change. Either you had a feisty babe working the bar, or an old jock with a grizzled face and damaged ears. Seemed to be a universal constant she considered mentioning to a few mathematicians, just to see their reaction.

  This bar had gone in on the dude concept. It was a dude kind of place, which had probably suited the man Javier Aritza had once been.

  What would five years of slavery do to someone as vibrant, as goofball crazy as Javier?

  Mina didn’t know.

  But she had promised him she would be here to meet him. Even when one quick perusal of the news over the last year reassured her that he would never set foot on a Concord station again. At least not as long as all those warrants for his arrest existed.

  Mina glanced down at her outfit. She’d dug this one out of the back of the closet then hemmed and tailored it to fit her new form, down two kilos and three dress sizes from when she’d worn it the first time.

  Black pants still a little baggier than was the style these days. A skin-tight, long-sleeve shirt, also in black, with a gray sleeveless tunic and a standing collar over it tabard-style, held in place by a black leather belt.

  Mina knew she looked good in flat black. It accentuated all the curves she worked so hard to get back and then keep.

  On her right breast was the logo of the Shepherds, a hollow blue ring with a green ellipse painted across it, representing rings. She had that same design in bright brass on both side sides of her collar.

  Her strawberry blond hair was still long, but starting to come in gray in a few places, making her feel older than she looked, but she was also older than anyone imagined, and her grandmother had still be a babe at seventy with long white hair and that same chiseled jawline.

  Shepherd of the Word, although nobody in here would recognize the uniform she was wearing. They would know it meant something, just not what.

  Mina checked the time on her wristwatch and looked around once more. Technically, she was early, but could only imagine what Javier might come up with for sneaking in. Some sort of interesting disguise even better than the one she had made up for him, or the ones he had probably invented for himself to keep the evil galaxy at bay.

  A woman entered the bar. She didn’t look like she belonged, but the same could be said of Mina, at the end of the day. There were eleven females in here, but the other nine included two bar maids, five girlfriends, and two working girls taking a break from hustling for tricks.

  This woman was in a different class, altogether. Money. Power. Assurance utterly at odds with most of the room.

  Most.

  Their eyes connected and Mina felt the jolt of recognition from the other.

  The stranger approached.

  Tall for a woman, but still half a head shorter than Mina. Gorgeous, golden skin the color of burnished gold. Black hair up in a braid that probably hung past her bottom when it was loose. Dark brown eyes locked in on Mina’s face.

  Mina noted her flash of a glance to one side and remembered the couple on a date that hadn’t seemed to fit in when she had first entered. Close, but off pattern when most of the men in here were blue collar stiffs having a drink before, during, or after work.

  Mina tapped a pocket with an elbow to reassure herself that the stun pulsar she’d stolen was still there. She had once taught several forms of martial arts as self-defense for young woman students intending to follow The Way. Still spe
nt thirty minutes every morning remembering that with her muscles.

  This woman was not trouble, but she’d brought a pair of bodyguards with her. Sent them in ahead, quietly, and then not come in herself until one of them had signaled.

  The tall table Mina sat at was not bolted down. Two stools plus the one she was using, if she needed to throw something.

  How far have we fallen from that imaginary golden age that Rama imagined? The one that probably never happened. If he’d been successful, there would have been no need for the Shepherds. That they’d mostly faded was due to other problems and the two long wars since. Not due to their success.

  Mina grimaced internally and adopted a vague smile as the woman walked closer. She was dressed in a dark, almost somber maroon suit, the kind with striped pants and a double-breasted jacket over a conservative vanilla shirt. Some jewelry, but not much.

  Tasteful and quiet, on a woman who looked like she had aimed to land just this side of dowdy today.

  Mina watched.

  The woman walked right over and smiled politely.

  “Wilhelmina Teague?” she asked in a quiet enough voice that nobody else would have heard.

  Like perhaps unsure what name one might be using on obviously forged identity papers.

  Mina had no interest in becoming a museum exhibit, even though both Javier and Zakhar Sokolov had suggested that she could make a nice living, just being able to tell historians what it had been like, being alive in those days.

  Mina nodded carefully, aware that the woman had already brought trouble with her.

  Had Javier sent her? She didn’t look at all like Holly or Fryda, Javier’s two ex-wives.

  And yet, he was the only person she was aware of that knew she was supposed to be in this bar, on this day.

  “May I?” the woman gestured to the seat directly across.

  Again, Mina nodded, glass half full and ready to fly into the woman’s face if needed.

  The stranger was grace itself as she sat.

  They studied each other for a long moment as one of the bar maids made her way over.

  “Red wine,” the woman said in a throaty alto that had been trained to give orders. “House blend is fine.”

  The other woman went away and Mina caught an appraising smile.

  “I would say Javier sent me,” the woman announced quietly. “But he doesn’t know I’ve come personally. He sent a letter to be delivered to you by courier, never imagining I would do it myself.”

  Mina nodded. Waited for the shoe to drop. She’d heard some of Javier’s adventures, at least as the rambunctious press had turned them into lurid Escapades: Svalbard. Altai. Nidavellir.

  Javier had not been leading a life of sober rectitude after they had parted ways. But he hadn’t been doing it before then, either.

  “You’re just like he described you,” the stranger continued, as if she hadn’t noticed that Mina had remained perfectly silent. “And Djamila and Afia, as well.”

  Who the hell was this person that she knew those three names?

  “We haven’t been formally introduced,” the stranger suddenly held out a friendly hand.

  Mina took it automatically, still a little off center from the fact that this stranger had to have known much of the crew of Storm Gauntlet well enough to come here and mention those names casually.

  “Mina Teague,” she said carefully.

  The papers were mostly correct, with the only lies being her planet of birth, because folks from Earth itself were rare this far out, and her birth year.

  “I know,” the other said. “My name is Behnam Shirazi. I am the Khatum of Altai.”

  Oh shit.

  Behnam watched the impact of her words on the Sleeping Beauty Javier had rescued. He was good at that sort of thing, if you included Afia, Djamila, Rainier, Bethany, and several others Behnam had heard about.

  “He doesn’t know you came?” Teague asked in a breathless sort of rattle.

  “No,” Behnam smiled. “He agonized for months, but in the end sat down and wrote you a letter.”

  Behnam reached inside her jacket and pulled it out, handing it to Mina’s hands. The seal was still intact, just as he had given it to her to hand off to a courier.

  Javier probably never imagined she’d do it, but Behnam had been fascinated by the stories told by the others. Javier had always been a little reticent, but she put that down to the man having fallen madly in love with Mina Teague then not being sure how to handle it.

  Djamila could have explained, but it would be years yet before Javier went to the Dragoon for advice.

  Mina took the envelope and slipped it into a pocket inside her tabard.

  “What happened?” Mina finally managed after a drink to clear her throat.

  Behnam paused while the waitress delivered the wine and used that to study the tall, elegant Shepherd of the Word.

  She’d even taken time on this trip to read up on Rama Treadwell and the Order he had spawned, just to prepare herself for the last true Shepherd left in the universe.

  “Someone hired a killer named Eutrupio Navarre to go after a man,” Behnam said with a wry smile. “After Salekhard and Abraam Tamaz, he was bound and determined to pull off a caper where absolutely nobody was killed. He came close to injuring nobody, but one of my best assassins fell in love with Djamila and they ended up in a final confrontation that caused the man to be stunned before Javier and Djamila made their escape.”

  “Stunned?” Mina asked blankly. Djamila had merely stunned someone as part of an escape?

  Behnam nodded over to where Farouz Jashari and Rence Moore were seated and watching carefully.

  “Just stunned,” she said. “After that I sent Navarre an invitation to return, but honestly didn’t expect him to take me up on it. Or to bring the entire crew of Storm Gauntlet, the salvaged wreck of Hammerfield, and Suvi to my doorstep. Suvi said to tell you hi, but didn’t tell Javier that she knew what I was going to do.”

  “Suvi knew?” Mina gasped.

  “I have inherited something of an adult step-daughter to go with my own four children,” Behnam smiled. “She is the one who told me about Salekhard.”

  Behnam liked the way the tall woman blushed in response. Only a handful of people knew that a suppoedly-peaceful Shepherd of the Word had been the one that actually killed that pirate ship personally.

  Everyone attributed it to Navarre. Because Javier always took the worst punishment onto himself to spare others. Just one of the reasons Behnam had fallen in love with that pirate.

  “And you came because…?”

  “Because I wanted to know more about you as a person, rather than a character in stories the others told,” Behnam replied. “Your story is probably more bizarre than Javier’s at the end of the day, although I understand why you tell so few people.”

  “You know?” Mina asked.

  “I have planetary resources at my fingertips, Wilhelmina Teague,” Behnam said in a more serious tone. “Competent ninjas in a variety of flavors. They were able to find me a wealth of information on Rama and the Shepherds, but almost nothing about you. That told me you were keeping an exceptionally low profile.”

  “True,” she said. “And please just call me Mina. I feel like we’re probably already friends and that I’ve just forgotten a few things.”

  Behnam nodded and smiled.

  “So I’m here,” she said, taking a sip of the red wine. “I considered bringing a rose, as Javier would have, but that would have sent the wrong message, as I wanted to measure you as a person. As a professional.”

  “Why?” Mina asked bluntly, seemingly finding her feet again finally.

  “Because Javier has taken it upon himself to save the galaxy, Mina,” Behnam said. “And I’m helping, both because it is a good thing to do, and also because I never expected to find a love like his at my age.”

  “I am not a threat,” Mina turned defensive.

  “I know,” Behnam reassured her. “Again, that’s not
why I’m here.”

  “Why, then?”

  “Because Paladins are men and women of the Sword, Mina Teague,” she said. “Your words to Javier. A willingness to do violence to others for no other reason than the galaxy calls upon you to fight evil. I wanted to know if you still had that in you.”

  Mina fell silent and studied her now under hooded brows now, probably flashing back to saying those very words to Javier when he demanded that she become a killer. Behnam knew Mina had a near eidetic memory. Her memories would be a rare prize to historians everywhere, simply because she could recreate some conversation that had happened five centuries ago, down to the tone and intonation.

  “What has Javier done?” Mina asked, almost bristling now.

  “Taken the old Neu Berne warship Hammerfield and poured Suvi into it,” Behnam said flatly. “Brought along the crew of the now-destroyed Storm Gauntlet and recruited more hands. Gone off to the far side of the galaxy, nominally to establish new trade routes leading back to Altai.”

  “Suvi owns Hammerfield?” Mina gasped.

  “Yes, but Javier and the others voted to rename it Excalibur, for reasons a scholar like you might appreciate,” Behnam said. “And now my favorite Knight Errant is off trying to make the galaxy better.”

  “Where do I fit in all this?” Mina asked.

  “You have chosen to continue seeking clues about the disappearance of Rama Treadwell,” Behnam turned serious. “Six hundred and fifty-six years after he disappeared, at a point when he has functionally become nothing but a legend. You could have retired to one of your Order’s existing retreats and spent the rest of your life rebuilding the sadly-decayed Shepherds of the Word into something useful in the modern age. You could have joined a university faculty somewhere, and King’s College at Altai will always welcome you. But you have chosen the Way of the Sword.”

  Behnam watched the impact of those words on Mine Teague. Hitting her with a pain stick wouldn’t have created that much of a flinch. Mina nearly spilled her glass, even what little was left in the bottom.